TROUBLED engineering group Invensys fired the starting gun for its latest round of sell-offs yesterday, off-loading its loss-making Dutch software business Baan.

The group, which last week posted pre-tax losses of &#xA3;1.39bn for the year to March 31, said it is to sell Baan to private equity firms Cerberus Capital Management, and General Atlantic Partners for $135m (&#xA3;82.4m).

Baan ran up operating losses of $32m (&#xA3;19.5m) in the year to March 31 on a turnover of $265m (&#xA3;161.7m).

The deal was widely anticipated as the first step in a disposal programme announced in February which will effectively halve Invensys in size allowing it to concentrate on production management and rail systems operations.

The sell-off programme follows a similar round of disposals begun last year which brought in &#xA3;1.8bn.

Chief executive Rick Haythornthwaite said last week that he was confident that the latest round of disposals, which will see Invensys's energy management division sold off, could bring in more than the figure raised last time.

Invensys expects the deal, which is subject to regulatory approval, to be completed by the end of the month.

Shares in Invensys edged down 0.25p at 18.25p.

Stripping out Baan, the production management division saw operating profits rise from &#xA3;28m a year ago to &#xA3;53m after aggressive action to cut costs.

The group also revealed that under the FRS17 accounting rule its pensions deficit on March 31 was &#xA3;931m.